Donald Sutherland in Ordinary People

So, I was watching Ordinary People last night -- great, great movie, had never seen all of it -- and noticed afterward that Mary Tyler Moore, Judd Hirsch and C. Thomas Howell were all nominated for Academy Awards. (Hutton was the only one to win.)

Why not Donald Sutherland?

I looked up the nominees from 1980: Robert De Niro (winner), Raging Bull; Robert Duvall (Great Santini); John Hurt (Elephant Man); Jack Lemmon (Tribute) and Peter O'Toole (The Stuntman). I saw the first three, and they were all great. Did not see the other two.

So, I was watching Ordinary People last night -- great, great movie, had never seen all of it -- and noticed afterward that Mary Tyler Moore, Judd Hirsch and C. Thomas Howell were all nominated for Academy Awards. (Hutton was the only one to win.)

Why not Donald Sutherland?

I looked up the nominees from 1980: Robert De Niro (winner), Raging Bull; Robert Duvall (Great Santini); John Hurt (Elephant Man); Jack Lemmon (Tribute) and Peter O'Toole (The Stuntman). I saw the first three, and they were all great. Did not see the other two.

For those of you old enough to remember, was Sutherland shafted here?

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Having seen everything but the Lemmon, can't deny De Niro, who carried what to me was the best movie of the '80s.

Still, I get silly about The Stunt Man. Vastly-underrated. O'Toole's his usual
flamboyant self, and Barbara Hershey's gorgeous.

This was the era where the Academy inexplicably accepted supporting-role nominations for actors who clearly had lead roles. I don't have time to go through IMDB right now, but Nicholson for Terms of Endearment (and he won) is another really-leading-role example that stands out.

Sutherland could have been nominated, but his was a supporting role, at best.

Hutton, who was great in Ordinary People, had a lead role. His struggle was the focal point of the film. It was in no way a supporting role. Had he been nominated for Best Actor, though, he would have had no chance with the Raging Bull DeNiro on the docket.

Moore, as Mizzou said, was terrific and chilling -- the complete opposite of characters she had played up to that point, something some critics doubted she could pull off -- but she was up against another legendary role: Sissy Spacek in Coal Miner's Daughter.

I've seen Ordinary People on lists of the worst Oscar-winning films, which is disappointing. I absolutely loved it.